ABC Barbie

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Congratulations to Ita Buttrose for being designated the next ABC chair, where the former Murdoch and Packer editor will no doubt soon be captured by an essentially anti-Murdoch/Packer (in word and deed) taxpayer-funded but taxpayer-disregarding media behemoth. Congratulations also to Buttrose for having been made into a toy (not by the ABC just yet; that will come later):

You know you’ve really made it when you get your very own Barbie doll.

Veteran journalist Ita Buttrose has been honoured by toy manufacture Mattel with a Barbie doll made in her own likeness…

The media mogul’s customised Barbie doll has been released just in time for the famous doll’s 60th birthday.

The Ita Buttrose Barbie is dressed in a bright red shirt and jacket, paired with a black skirt and heels.

With the polished “Buttrose bob”, the doll looks every bit the Ita Buttrose that Australia knows and loves.

She even clutches a black handbag with a newspaper peeking out of the top…

According to Buttrose, having her own personal Barbie doll is a huge honour.

“It’s important that girls have visible role models, and when they play with dolls like Barbie, they imagine everything they can become and believe that anything is possible,” she said.

Amen to that – though there are just a few things that will be different when the spanking new ABC-specific Ita Barbie is released:

It’s a good start that the ABC Barbie is predominantly red. In a reverse of the usual “watermelon” rule, if you were to cut the doll apart you would discover that she is red on the outside and green on the inside

You don’t play with the ABC Barbie; the ABC Barbie plays with you

She carries a large black bag to staff over $1 billion of taxpayers’ money into

Needless to say, she is not a one-off purchase; she keeps costing and costing you. In fact, everybody gets their own ABC Barbie, even if they would rather have some Lego or a toy gun

ABC Barbie is ostensibly white but very ashamed of it (the doll comes with privilege included)

She is also ostensibly female, but her genital situation suggests gender fluidity

Whatever you do, never remind the ABC Barbie that she’s actually made of plastic and not of 100 per cent natural organic ingredients or else you will never stop hearing about the extra carbon offsets you also need to purchase in order to enjoy some guilt-free play

Attachments like the sense of entitlement, righteousness, bias and sanctimony aren’t optional extras; unfortunately they come as a whole set

Unlike the old generation of Barbie dolls, the ABC Barbie can be pressed (gently and having previously obtained consent) to say a number of comforting catch-phrases like “I watch ABC and I vote”, “Hands off the national broadcaster”, “Orange man bad” and “Catastrophic climate change is already here and threatening the survival of our civilisation”

There will definitely be an ABC Ken coming up in the near future, though he will be somewhat ashamed about it. Appropriately, he will lack balls.